Before a big race or event, it’s been shown that a small amount of anxiety or excitation can help with performance.
It might give us a percent or two, but comes at a cost.
When we ramp the nervous system up with increased adrenaline and cortisol (mobilising hormones), we then shift further into a flight or fight response.
This is something that can have a negative impact in the longer term.
So, on race day, this hype can help.
On the day to day level though, it is not something that we need.
Rather, what we are usually after is consistency, performance with composure and a sense of happiness and wellbeing while we do our work.
Often, when we take measures to take the edge off of the intensity (less social media, less screen time, less high intensity training), we can relax into the task and see an increase in our performance across the longer time domains.
